Copyright: Visual Help ® 1993-1994 Firas Bushnaq


Contents
Spud City To-Do v. 1.0

Contents

Introduction

What Is Spud City To-Do?

Three-Minute Tutorial

Using Spud City To-Do's Features

Working With Tasks

Options

Creating Print Outs

Keyboard Shortcuts

Running On A Network

Important Misc. Stuff

Registration Information

Spud City Software Co.

Warranty, Disclaimer And Other Legal Statements


What Is Spud City To Do
What Is Spud City To-Do?

Is it a new type of french fry? Perhaps a long-forgotten ragtime tune?

No, it's the simplest, slickest to-do list manager for Windows. We wrote it for absent-minded people like us who juggle a lot of different projects and need to keep our priorities straight. Did we mention we're absent-minded?

Spud City To-Do's strength is that it doesn't try to be anything other than what it is, a to-do list manager. We focused on that one function, and worked our little hearts out trying to make it the best one possible.


Three Minute Tutorial
Three-Minute Tutorial

Print Out This Topic!

Before you start, we recommend that you print out this help topic. Having a hard copy of the three-minute tutorial will make it easy to follow along as we take a brief, yet luxurious cruise through the serene waters of Spud City To-Do.

To print it out, turn on your printer and press the Print Topic button.

Add A Couple New Tasks

We'll start our voyage by adding a few tasks to the current task list (as opposed to the archive task list, which we'll get to later).

1 	Press the Add button. You now see the Add/Edit form.

2 	Type your task's description in the wide yellow box at the top of the page.

3 	Use your mouse or press the tab key to move to the calendar. Select a due date for the task you just typed in.

4 	Set its level of importance in the Priority section.

5 	Write up a memo to go along with it, if you wish.

6 	Press the Done button. Wow. You just added a task.

Repeat these steps four or five times (or more, if you're compulsive). Use different due dates; some earlier than today, some later.

When you've got a jolly little crew of tasks assembled, lean back and admire your work.

Notice that the colors of the tasks change depending on if they are upcoming tasks, if they are due today, or if they are overdue.

Set Your Preferences

Here's where the real fun starts. From the Options menu at the top of the screen, choose Sort By.

Try switching to the different sort orders, and watch how they affect the way your data is displayed on the screen.

Alarm

You need to set an alarm that matches your personality. From under the Options menu, select Alarm Sound.

Switch between the different alarm settings. As you select them, you SHOULD hear something. Depending on your computer system, you might not hear some of them. Stick with the one that sounds the best to you.

Default Action For 'Done' Tasks

This setting will determine what Spud City To-Do does with your tasks after you've accomplished them. For instance, if one of your tasks says 'Wash the car', and you get the car washed, you'll want to take that task off the list (duh). You can either erase it forever, or archive it.

Archiving saves it to a dusty old file where old tasks sit around and talk about the good old days. You can go visit these archived tasks anytime you want.

•	If you know that you'll always want to archive your tasks, select Archive All 'Done' Tasks from Default Action For 'Done' Tasks under the Options menu.

•	If you don't ever, ever want to see your tasks again, select Erase All 'Done' Tasks. If you want to choose whether to archive or erase tasks each time you press the Done button, select Always Prompt For Decision.

Archive A Task

Let's send one of your tasks off to Archive-land.

1 	Click on a task you want to pretend you're done with.

2 	Now press the Done button. You see a dialog box that asks what you want to do with the task.

3 	Press the YES button. Poof! It's gone.

View Archive

Where do you suppose it went? Press the Archives button. Notice how the tasks here show the date they are completed. Also, note that they are sorted according to your currently selected sort order.

Now go back to the current task list by pressing the Current button.

Print Tasks

This is a nifty feature. It lets you view or print out your tasks in many, many different ways.

1 	To access it, press the Print button. You now see the print screen.

2 	If you have a printer hooked up to your computer, choose the destination Printer from your choices at the bottom of the screen, then press the Create Printout button.

3 	If you don't have a printer, simply press the Create Printout button; your report will be sent to your computer screen.

You should see all of your current tasks (and their memos). As you can tell from the other print options, you have complete control over which tasks will appear in your printouts.

Press the Cancel button.

Your tour is complete. You now have a good working knowledge of Spud City To-Do. Enjoy the program!


Working With Tasks

Add A Task

Edit A Task

What To Do When You're Done With A Task

How To 'Unarchive' Tasks


Add A Task

To add a new task to your list, press the Add button (if the button bar is visible), or select Add Task from the Task menu. You see a form which lets you fill in all the details of your task.

Also see:

Add/Edit Task Screen


Add Edit Task Screen
Add-Edit Task Screen

The Add/Edit screen is displayed whenever you select Add or Edit. Here are its components:

Task

The wide yellow box at the top holds your task description. You can type in as many as 45 characters. If you want to write more, we suggest you start up here, then use the Memo area at the bottom of the screen to finish your task description.

Priority

Select one of the four priorities. This will affect the order that your tasks are displayed in the task list. The default priority is None.

User Code

This is an optional entry to help you differentiate your tasks based on a coding scheme you make up yourself. For example, if you want to be able to keep track of all your tasks related to a  client, Smith, you might want to type in an S in the user code box each time you add a new Smith task. You'll see that you can isolate all the Smith 'S' tasks for display and printing purposes. The valid
entries here are the letters A to Z (they will be made upper case automatically), and the numbers 0 to 9. This gives you 36 different codes that you can assign.

Calendar

You can switch the due date using your mouse or arrow keys.

Alarm Time

Type a time in this box if you want to be reminded when a task should be done. If Spud City To-Do is running when the date and time comes due, a message box will pop up to remind you of the task, and an alarm will sound.

Repeat Task

If you have a task that you want to accomplish several times over a set period of time (for example, if you want to water your plants every three days), use this feature to set it up. Press the Repeat Task button. Then just enter the number of times you want to repeat the task, and the interval of days between each task.

Memo

This is where you can write lengthy notes about a particular task. Some users like to write notes here about the results of their tasks (often meetings and telephone conversations) so they will have a permanent record of who said what.


Edit A Task

To edit an existing task, you can press the Edit button (if the button bar is visible), or select Edit Task from the Task menu. You can also double-click on the task with your left mouse button. You see a form which lets you edit all the details of your task.

Also see:

Add/Edit Task Screen


Done With A Task

When you have completed one of your tasks (or just want to erase it) press the Done button or select Done With A Task from under the Tasks menu. Depending on your Options setting under Default Action For Done Tasks, your
task either will be erased, archived, or you will be asked which of those choices you want.

Also see:

Default Action For Done Tasks


Default Action For Done Tasks
Default Action For 'Done' Tasks

This setting will determine what Spud City To-Do does with your tasks after you've accomplished them. You can either choose to archive all your done tasks, erase all your done tasks, or select from those choices each time a task is done.


Unarchive Task

The menu choice Unarchive Task is only available from under the Tasks menu when you are viewing archives. When you click the Unarchive Task item, whichever task is highlighted in the archive list will be returned to the current task list.


Options

Sort By

You can group your tasks in different ways by changing the way they are sorted on the screen. Select Sort By from under the Options menu, then choose one of the four options:

•	Date, then Priority, then User Code

•	Date, then User Code, then Priority

•	Priority, then Date

•	User Code, then Date

Default Action For 'Done' Tasks

This setting will determine what Spud City To-Do does with your tasks after you've accomplished them. You can either choose to archive all your done tasks, erase all your done tasks, or select from those choices each time a task is done.

Default Due Date

Every time you call up the Add Task screen, the calendar shows a default date. That date is set according to what you have selected under Default Due Date, which is under the Options menu. You either can select Today, Tomorrow, or Day After Tomorrow.

Show Button Bar

You can hide or show the button bar by toggling on and off the menu choice Show Button Bar from under the Options menu. You know it's on if you see the check mark next to it. The button bar is darn handy to use, but it takes up space. Try it both ways. Suit  yourself.

Colors

To change the colors of the current list, select Colors from the Options menu. You'll see a list of thoughtful color combinations on the left hand side of the screen, and a sample of a list box on the right. Try the different color options, and select the one that looks best to you.

Icon Caption

If you have trouble getting your screen saver to 'sleep' try switching the Icon Caption from under the Options menu from Show Date And Time to Show Date Only.

Alarm Sound

Alarm sounds are an important part of Spud City To-Do. To select one that works best for you (and your computer), try the different ones available under Alarm Sound in the Options menu. Each time you select one, you SHOULD hear it. If you don't hear it, then select another one that you DO hear.


Printing

This is a great feature. Even if you don't want a hard copy printout of your tasks, you can use the Print feature to search for text strings in your task descriptions and memos. Here's how everything works:

Task Due Status

Check off the types of tasks that you want to include in your printout. Your choices are Overdue Tasks, Today's Tasks, Upcoming Tasks, and Archived Tasks.

Dates

Your choices here are All Dates, Today Only, and Date Range.

•	All Dates will consider all of your tasks for the printout.

•	Today Only will only consider those tasks which are due today (or, for archived tasks, were completed today).

•	Date Range will narrow the search down to a specified date range. Type in your beginning date and ending date for the search.

NOTE: If you're dealing with current tasks, the date searched will be the date due. However, if you're dealing with archived tasks, the date searched will be the date completed.

Priority

If you want to print out only tasks that have a certain priority, then make your wishes know here.

User Codes

If you want to narrow down your printout to tasks that contain only certain user codes, type them in here. You can squish them all together like this: AHZ Or you can separate them with spaces and/or commas, like this: A, H, Z.

Text Filter

If you are looking for a particular piece in either your task description or in your memo, then use Text Filter to help find it. Just type in the text you are looking for. Spud City To-Do will do a non-case sensitive search. That means if you type in here that you're looking for the word, bicycle, you'll get back any task or memo that includes bicycle, Bicycle, BICYCLE or BiCyClE. Pretty
weird, huh?

Header

A header is the title that appears at the very top of your printout. You can impress everybody by using this feature to create your own custom header. I can almost hear the oohs and aahs now.

Note: This feature is only available to registered users. Non-registered users are stuck with the naggy header. Sorry about that, but we've got to pay for our kids' happy meals somehow.

Destination

Where do you want your report to go? If you want to see it on your computer screen, select the Computer Screen option. If you want it to print on paper, select Printer. If you'd rather work with a text file, select File. It will be saved in the same subdirectory as your To-Do program, under the name TODO.TXT. If you already have a file named TODO.TXT in that subdirectory when you create a new one, the old one will be erased. It's a cruel world sometimes.

Create Printout

This is the button you push to actually have Spud City To-Do search your tasks and compile the printout. Keep in mind that for a task to appear on your printout, it must match ALL of the criteria that you set on this screen.


Keyboard Shortcuts
Keyboard Shortcuts & Other Goodies

Keyboard Wizardry

If your program's focus is on the current task list, the following keys will perform these actions:

•	E = Edit

•	A = Add

•	D = Done

Note that if the focus is on the button bar, these keys won't do anything. To set the focus on the current task list, click on it once with your mouse. Now you're in business.

Double-Click To Edit

Double click on any of the tasks on your list, and you'll jump into the Edit screen with that task. This works with both the current and archive task list.

The Long And The Short Of It

Grab the bottom of the Spud City To-Do window and drag it up to make it shorter. The list box will shrink proportionally. Try the opposite. Grab the bottom of the window and make it longer.

Aren't you glad you read this help topic?


Network Feature
Running On A Network

It's possible to store Spud City To-Do's data files on a network. The only reason you'd want to do this is if the network drive gets backed up more frequently than the local drive. Don't attempt this network drive thing unless you know what the hell you are doing.

1 	First, install Spud City To-Do normally on your local computer's hard drive.

2 	Make an icon for it in a window group.

3 	Run it at least once to make ensure that the six M1.xxx and M2.xxx files (three of each) get created.

4 	Exit Spud City To-Do.

5 	Now, create a subdirectory on your network drive to hold those files.

6 	Copy the six M1 and M2 files to this new network subdirectory.

7 	Erase the six M1 and M2 files from your local hard drive.

8 	Click ONCE on the icon that starts Spud City To-Do (but don't start it!).

9 	Under Program Manager, select the File menu, then choose Properties.

10 	Look at the box designated Command Line. After the path that appears in the Command Line entry, add a space and then the path name to your network subdirectory.

For example if it now reads C:\TODO\TODO.EXE and you moved the M1 and M2 files to F:\HARRY\TODO\ then change the command line to read: C:\TODO\TODO.EXE F:\HARRY\TODO\

The next time you start Spud City To-Do from your icon, it will use the data files on your network.


Registration Information

Is This A Free Program?

No. Spud City To-Do is distributed using the shareware method. That means you're free to try it for a month to see if you like it. If you decide to keep it beyond the trial period, send in your registration fee to us (Spud City Software), and we'll mail you back your very own registration code. This will make you an official registered user. Join the club. Learn the secret handshake. Do the dance.

What Is Its Price?

Spud City To-Do is cheap. It only costs $14.50 to register it. If you want to register your copy AND receive the latest version on disk, send us a total of $19.50. That's a small price to pay for organizing your life and making you a better person.

Registration Benefits

No More Nag Screen

Spud City To-Do registered users are given a registration code that rids them of the 'nag screen' that appears when the program starts. You say you don't see a nag screen? You will, sooner or later.

Ability To Change Report Header

Only registered users can create custom headers in printouts.

Access To Upgrades And Updates

We also contact registered users when major upgrades are released, and offer it to them at a substantial discount. Also, if a significant bug is discovered, only registered users will be contacted with a fix for it (let's hope it never happens, though).

Encourage New Features, Innovation

Your registration allow us to devote more time improving and upgrading Spud City To-Do.

Payment Options

Okay, I'm Hooked. How Do I Pay?

•	If you want to pay by check, VISA, or MasterCard and you have a printer:

From under the Help menu, select Registration, then Reg. Form. Fill in your name and other information. Print out the registration form and mail it in.

•	If you want to pay by check, VISA , or MasterCard and you DON'T have a printer:

Write us a note, saying that you want to register a copy of Spud City To-Do. Tell us your name and address, and what version you're using now. If you want to pay by credit card, write down your card number, expiration date, and sign your name somewhere. If you're paying by check, include that. Send the whole ball of wax off to: Spud City Software Co., P.O. Box 16062, Boise, ID 83715.

•	If you have CompuServe account, here's a payment option:

While logged in to CompuServe, type GO SWREG and follow the prompts.

Spud City To-Do's program ID number for registration only is 3769. For registration AND the latest copy on disk, the program ID number is 3770.

The $14.50 or $19.50 gets added to your next month's CompuServe bill.

Within a day or two of registering via SWREG,  Spud City Software Co. will E-Mail you a confirmation.

•	If you have E-Mail access to CompuServe, and want to pay by credit card, here's yet another payment option:

Leave us an E-Mail message at 76660,3524, and explain that you want to register your copy of Spud City To-Do. We'll send back an E-Mail to you, requesting the appropriate credit card information and verifying the amount of the transaction.

I Live Outside The U.S., Should I Pay A Little More?

Not unless you're filthy rich and don't care about money. In that case, pay 100 times the regular amount. Otherwise, pay the standard $14.50 or $19.50.

Multiple Registrations

What's The Price To Register Several Copies?

It varies. Write to us with the approximate quantity you have in mind.


Spud City Software Co
Spud City Software Co.

Based in Boise, Idaho, Spud City Software Co. specializes in shareware programs and lame humor.

Spud City Software Co.
P.O. Box 16062
Boise, ID 83715

CompuServe ID: 76660,3524

Thank you for your interest in this program!


Warranty and Disclaimer

Software

Spud City Software Co. warrants that the software contained herein will perform in substantial compliance with the documentation accompanying the software. If you report, in writing, a significant defect to us and we are unable to correct it within 30 days of the date you report the defect, you may return the software and accompanying materials, and we will refund the purchase price.

Diskettes and Documentation

Spud City Software Co. warrants all diskettes and documentation to be free of defects in materials for 30 days from the date of purchase. In the event of notification within the warranty period of defects in any materials, Spud City Software Co. will replace the defective diskette or documentation.

Remedies

The remedy for breach of warranty shall be limited to replacement and shall not encompass any other damages, including but not limited to loss of profit, special, incidental, consequential, or similar damages, losses, or claims.

Disclaimer

Spud City Software Co. specifically disclaims all other warranties, expressed or implied. This includes, but is not limited to, implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose. In no event shall Spud City Software Co. or its owners be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damage, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential or other damages.

Governing Law

This Warranty and Disclaimer statement shall be construed, interpreted, and governed by the laws of the State of Idaho.

Required VB/ISAM Statement

This software was created using VB/ISAM, Copyright Software Source 1991-1994; all rights reserved. VB/ISAM software may not be used, copied, modified, transferred, or distributed except as expressly provided in its software license. Only licensees of VB/ISAM may create software that uses any part of VB/ISAM. Software Source, Freemont, California, USA; telephone (510) 623-7854.